I saw this recipe for a pineapple and mango Napoleon the other day and just about fell over salivating (http://tastefoodblog.com/2010/09/09/caramelized-pineapple-and-mango-napo...) - and I don't even LIKE dessert! I imagine that you could get away with using canned peaches and pineapple rings. The trick to caramelizing is just hitting those things with a blow torch. :)
I LOVE Trader Joes! It is the only store I'll shop in (The Wife will go to the other stores). I think a lot of it has to do with how nice every seems to be and the fact that their prices are outstanding despite how everything is organic.
I lend at lendingclub and you can read about my experience here: http://www.wisebread.com/peer-to-peer-lending-prosper-marketplace-or-len.... I really don't mind people paying off their loans early and I really like lending to sensible people like Andrea who want to reduce their debts faster. I have 100 loans and so far 9 are fully paid early and I just reinvested that money. Yes, it takes a bit more work to reinvest, but at least I get my money back.
One of the basic tenants of finance my Grandma taught me was "money makes money." While she meant that from an investment perspective, the same can be said with respect for education in that the upper class tend to bestow financial knowledge and an underlying education on their children much more than the middle and lower class in society.
I remember taking home economics in middle and high school and thinking it should be called "cooking." That was all the economics/finance education I received, until I went out and learned it myself.
I attended a public school, however, and moving to NYC I've learned that basic finances are indeed taught in school here, as are other valuable subjects like Mandarin...for a price of $31,118 in annual tuition --- for Kindergarten.
Yes, grandma, money makes money indeed. Hopefully someday public schools will get around to teaching these fundamental concepts as well.
Perhaps if school stressed reading, writing, math, history, and civics children could figure out life skills with the help of parents not the nanny gov't.
"But again, we’re conditioned to think we need more than we actually do. This is part of the reason selling everything can be so cathartic."
This is so true! Finding out that you don't NEED so much is incredibly freeing, because NEEDING is actually exhausting. Realizing that you can get by without much stuff is empowering.
Paying off debt faster does mean that investors make less, but it's not discouraged. You can pay off your loan at any time without penalties, as I mentioned in the article.
My method is actually going to be to put aside money every month that I would normally put toward my debt, in a high-interest savings account through my credit union. Then, when I've amassed enough to get rid of the remainder of the debt, I'll pay it off.
Definitely. I believe it should be a required subject. An alarming number of adults cannot even balance a checkbook because they were never taught how to do so. The importance of credit, financing, leasing, etc. should be stressed to students, not to mention how these things can affect your life. Another area that should be addressed is filling out a simple W4 form. As noted above, sometimes it is like the blind leading the blind. If the parents don't know how to do it, how are their children to learn? Although it is not mandatory for my daughter, she has opted to take the course this semester at our insistence.
I definitely feel that finances should be taught in School. An organization I belong to has put together a program that we take to middle schools in our area. The children chose a profession. They receive a specific amount of money in a form of a paycheck according the the average that profession receives. Then they have to go to each station and pay for groceries, car loans, education loans, vacations, etc. They spin the wheel of life and sometimes they win the lottery, but they have to pay taxes on the winnings. Sometimes they have to pay for glasses or repairs to the heater.
I was in charge of the grocery store. I was surprised how many children didn't even know what the word frugal meant. I had given price that they had to pay according to how many people were in their family and how many times they ate out. Some of the kids were amazed how much they had to pay. Some changed their minds and decided that they were going to eat at home for every meal.
This 2 hour program helped the kids realize that money doesn't grow on trees and how much their parents have to pay just to buy their designer clothes. It would be interesting to follow up with those children to see how they view spending money after that.
YES...this should be taught in school. I had a consumer science class that we had to take so we could graduate. It was boring but we were taught about how to get a loan for a car or home, car insurance, health insurance and the different kinds of life insurance. What you need to know to get an apartment and how to prepare a budget.
My daughter is taking a personal finance class in college and is finding out that mom & dad know what they are talking about when we say you need to prepare for your future and emergencies.
You mentioned that you were going to pay off your Lending Club loan quicker (to get rid of the debt monkey)...how does this affect the investors that bought into your loan...is their return smaller then, or do you have to pay a penalty for paying it off early? When I began investigating Lending Club and similar sites, I could not find solutions to paying off a loan earlier than expected.
I think it would be helpful for personal finance to be incorporated into various other classes, but not sure if a specific course is warranted.
I remember learning about interest, budgetting and how to balance a checkbook as part of my high school math courses, mostly the lower level algebra courses. I also learned how to dilute anti-freeze, make change in my head and, yes, how to compute when two trains going in opposite directions will pass each other, all from algebra story problems.
Somewhere along the way I learned how to write checks. I think that might actually have been elementary school when we were learning/practicing handwriting. High school US history and economics classes taught me more about how the US financial system works.
To me (I'm an engineer, not a teacher) it seems like it would be very easy to work personal finance into so many different courses in schools as an application of the concepts that are already being taught. If that's not done, I think it should be.
Absolutely, positively, 1000% yes. If you know who won the Battle of Trafalgar, and not how to balance your checkbook, that is an epic "F" in life. One of the most important life lessons that children can be taught is how to live within their means, the value of money, and the difference between a want and a need.
Yes! As a former teacher, I know it's hard to find the time to add more curriculum, but I think it is a really valuable skill. Financial lessons should be taught at home, but I don't think we can assume that it will be taught. Ideally, it could be taught as a sort of long term role play within the context of other subjects including social studies (supply and demand) and math (obviously, huh?). By role play, I mean for kids to receive play money throughout the year, have a "job" in the classroom and have to rent/mortgage their space (desk or locker as a substitute for house). Perhaps a partnership could be formed with banks or credit card companies as part of their community outreach - to teach responsible borrowing and have subject matter experts included.
Absolutely! I have stressed this for many years that personal finance isn't taught in schools and it should be. You want kids to learn geometry, chemistry, alegebra, etc. but you don't teach them common sense things that they are going to face in the everyday world! I think that is part of the problem with the economy today! If they didn't have parents that taught them the RIGHT way to deal with their finances they wouldn't have a clue!
Oh hell yes! This is one of my biggest gripes with public school. They spent years pounding American History into our heads (reviewing the same stuff we learned in middle school), forced us to learn paper-writing methods in prep for college that weren't even used in college, etc etc, but taught us nothing about getting ready for the "real world," and a huuuuge part of that is personal finance. I am so fortunate that I had parents who knew better, but so many today don't. Even if only 5% more people retain what they learned about personal finance from school, that's still a huge amount.
It's not like this is a controversial topic to be teaching. I know there's a lot of other classes they need to fit in, but if they just take a few weeks during senior year to teach this, plenty of kids will be better off.
OUr son was taught personal finance in school -- and went through Financial Peace and STILL was an overdraft nightmare. Teaching is only half the battle. Until they feel like putting the knowledge into practice its pretty worthless.
But at least he had been exposed to the information.
We should be ashamed it isn't already. School is preparation. Why would we send our youngsters out into the world unprepared for the major continuing activity of their lives?
I can see it as one or two lectures to some of the older teenagers, but I can't see an entire semester spent on it or what kinds of homework assignments/tests the students would be given. So I could see it as the type of thing the schools do for young teens, where they gather everyone in an auditorium and go over STDs and birth control options, etc. It could be like that where they grab the high school juniors and seniors and go over the basics of finances (anyone younger than that is NOT going to pay attention or care; they aren't making money yet!)
All men are suckers for singed food. It's the caveman-BBQ gene that never gets bred out.
I am definitely trying out the custard recipe this week!
Nice recipe, Andrea. I, too, love a good kitchen torch! :)
I saw this recipe for a pineapple and mango Napoleon the other day and just about fell over salivating (http://tastefoodblog.com/2010/09/09/caramelized-pineapple-and-mango-napo...) - and I don't even LIKE dessert! I imagine that you could get away with using canned peaches and pineapple rings. The trick to caramelizing is just hitting those things with a blow torch. :)
Hey, Xin! I never saw that article, thanks for linking to it! I'll see if I can get it inserted into this article.
I LOVE Trader Joes! It is the only store I'll shop in (The Wife will go to the other stores). I think a lot of it has to do with how nice every seems to be and the fact that their prices are outstanding despite how everything is organic.
I lend at lendingclub and you can read about my experience here: http://www.wisebread.com/peer-to-peer-lending-prosper-marketplace-or-len.... I really don't mind people paying off their loans early and I really like lending to sensible people like Andrea who want to reduce their debts faster. I have 100 loans and so far 9 are fully paid early and I just reinvested that money. Yes, it takes a bit more work to reinvest, but at least I get my money back.
One of the basic tenants of finance my Grandma taught me was "money makes money." While she meant that from an investment perspective, the same can be said with respect for education in that the upper class tend to bestow financial knowledge and an underlying education on their children much more than the middle and lower class in society.
I remember taking home economics in middle and high school and thinking it should be called "cooking." That was all the economics/finance education I received, until I went out and learned it myself.
I attended a public school, however, and moving to NYC I've learned that basic finances are indeed taught in school here, as are other valuable subjects like Mandarin...for a price of $31,118 in annual tuition --- for Kindergarten.
Yes, grandma, money makes money indeed. Hopefully someday public schools will get around to teaching these fundamental concepts as well.
Perhaps if school stressed reading, writing, math, history, and civics children could figure out life skills with the help of parents not the nanny gov't.
"But again, we’re conditioned to think we need more than we actually do. This is part of the reason selling everything can be so cathartic."
This is so true! Finding out that you don't NEED so much is incredibly freeing, because NEEDING is actually exhausting. Realizing that you can get by without much stuff is empowering.
Paying off debt faster does mean that investors make less, but it's not discouraged. You can pay off your loan at any time without penalties, as I mentioned in the article.
http://www.lendingclub.com/kb/index.php?View=entry&EntryID=218
My method is actually going to be to put aside money every month that I would normally put toward my debt, in a high-interest savings account through my credit union. Then, when I've amassed enough to get rid of the remainder of the debt, I'll pay it off.
Definitely. I believe it should be a required subject. An alarming number of adults cannot even balance a checkbook because they were never taught how to do so. The importance of credit, financing, leasing, etc. should be stressed to students, not to mention how these things can affect your life. Another area that should be addressed is filling out a simple W4 form. As noted above, sometimes it is like the blind leading the blind. If the parents don't know how to do it, how are their children to learn? Although it is not mandatory for my daughter, she has opted to take the course this semester at our insistence.
I definitely feel that finances should be taught in School. An organization I belong to has put together a program that we take to middle schools in our area. The children chose a profession. They receive a specific amount of money in a form of a paycheck according the the average that profession receives. Then they have to go to each station and pay for groceries, car loans, education loans, vacations, etc. They spin the wheel of life and sometimes they win the lottery, but they have to pay taxes on the winnings. Sometimes they have to pay for glasses or repairs to the heater.
I was in charge of the grocery store. I was surprised how many children didn't even know what the word frugal meant. I had given price that they had to pay according to how many people were in their family and how many times they ate out. Some of the kids were amazed how much they had to pay. Some changed their minds and decided that they were going to eat at home for every meal.
This 2 hour program helped the kids realize that money doesn't grow on trees and how much their parents have to pay just to buy their designer clothes. It would be interesting to follow up with those children to see how they view spending money after that.
YES...this should be taught in school. I had a consumer science class that we had to take so we could graduate. It was boring but we were taught about how to get a loan for a car or home, car insurance, health insurance and the different kinds of life insurance. What you need to know to get an apartment and how to prepare a budget.
My daughter is taking a personal finance class in college and is finding out that mom & dad know what they are talking about when we say you need to prepare for your future and emergencies.
You mentioned that you were going to pay off your Lending Club loan quicker (to get rid of the debt monkey)...how does this affect the investors that bought into your loan...is their return smaller then, or do you have to pay a penalty for paying it off early? When I began investigating Lending Club and similar sites, I could not find solutions to paying off a loan earlier than expected.
I think it would be helpful for personal finance to be incorporated into various other classes, but not sure if a specific course is warranted.
I remember learning about interest, budgetting and how to balance a checkbook as part of my high school math courses, mostly the lower level algebra courses. I also learned how to dilute anti-freeze, make change in my head and, yes, how to compute when two trains going in opposite directions will pass each other, all from algebra story problems.
Somewhere along the way I learned how to write checks. I think that might actually have been elementary school when we were learning/practicing handwriting. High school US history and economics classes taught me more about how the US financial system works.
To me (I'm an engineer, not a teacher) it seems like it would be very easy to work personal finance into so many different courses in schools as an application of the concepts that are already being taught. If that's not done, I think it should be.
Absolutely! Start early and expand every year, just like other core subjects.
Absolutely, positively, 1000% yes. If you know who won the Battle of Trafalgar, and not how to balance your checkbook, that is an epic "F" in life. One of the most important life lessons that children can be taught is how to live within their means, the value of money, and the difference between a want and a need.
Yes! As a former teacher, I know it's hard to find the time to add more curriculum, but I think it is a really valuable skill. Financial lessons should be taught at home, but I don't think we can assume that it will be taught. Ideally, it could be taught as a sort of long term role play within the context of other subjects including social studies (supply and demand) and math (obviously, huh?). By role play, I mean for kids to receive play money throughout the year, have a "job" in the classroom and have to rent/mortgage their space (desk or locker as a substitute for house). Perhaps a partnership could be formed with banks or credit card companies as part of their community outreach - to teach responsible borrowing and have subject matter experts included.
Absolutely! I have stressed this for many years that personal finance isn't taught in schools and it should be. You want kids to learn geometry, chemistry, alegebra, etc. but you don't teach them common sense things that they are going to face in the everyday world! I think that is part of the problem with the economy today! If they didn't have parents that taught them the RIGHT way to deal with their finances they wouldn't have a clue!
Oh hell yes! This is one of my biggest gripes with public school. They spent years pounding American History into our heads (reviewing the same stuff we learned in middle school), forced us to learn paper-writing methods in prep for college that weren't even used in college, etc etc, but taught us nothing about getting ready for the "real world," and a huuuuge part of that is personal finance. I am so fortunate that I had parents who knew better, but so many today don't. Even if only 5% more people retain what they learned about personal finance from school, that's still a huge amount.
It's not like this is a controversial topic to be teaching. I know there's a lot of other classes they need to fit in, but if they just take a few weeks during senior year to teach this, plenty of kids will be better off.
OUr son was taught personal finance in school -- and went through Financial Peace and STILL was an overdraft nightmare. Teaching is only half the battle. Until they feel like putting the knowledge into practice its pretty worthless.
But at least he had been exposed to the information.
Yes, absolutely, it should be taught in schools!
We should be ashamed it isn't already. School is preparation. Why would we send our youngsters out into the world unprepared for the major continuing activity of their lives?
I can see it as one or two lectures to some of the older teenagers, but I can't see an entire semester spent on it or what kinds of homework assignments/tests the students would be given. So I could see it as the type of thing the schools do for young teens, where they gather everyone in an auditorium and go over STDs and birth control options, etc. It could be like that where they grab the high school juniors and seniors and go over the basics of finances (anyone younger than that is NOT going to pay attention or care; they aren't making money yet!)
I've never been to a TJ's but I have been to an Aldi store, and based on what was written above, they are very much alike.